Legalising medicinal marijuana is a controversial proposal but is the right thing to do, West Australian Labor leader Mark McGowan says. Mr McGowan announced the plan at the state branch's annual conference on Sunday, where he also said the WA Liberals were on the ropes but more work was needed to knock the Barnett government out of power.

WA's peak doctors' group will lobby medical authorities to deregister euthanasia advocate Philip Nitschke, saying he is a disgrace to their profession and could undo years of work by suicide prevention groups.

Labor MPs and candidates have launched a campaign in the Hunter to stop homeless people falling through the cracks, urging the state government to halt “ill-thought-out reforms”. At least six specialist homelessness services are at risk of closure in the region because they have so far missed out on ongoing funding.

Attorney-General George Brandis has admitted any changes to the Racial Discrimination Act will be delayed until later this year, as Australia's first law officer makes his way through the 5557 submissions on proposed changes to the Act.

Launceston-based Liberal Senator Stephen Parry is tomorrow expected to be elected President of the nation's upper house. The new-look Senate will sit for the first time tomorrow and one of its first orders of business will be to choose a replacement for the vacancy created by the retirement of former President, Labor's John Hogg.

The Abbott government has confirmed that 41 Sri Lankan asylum seekers who attempted to reach Australia by boat have been handed over to Sri Lankan authorities. Immigration Minister Scott Morrison released a statement on Monday saying that the asylum seekers, whose boat was intercepted in late June, were returned to Sri Lanka yesterday.

There has been a great deal of brouhaha lately about an attempt to deliver a talk at the so-called Festival of Dangerous Ideas on a very dangerous idea, that “Honour killings are morally justified”. The fact this is indeed a dangerous idea, unlike most of the other ideas at this gabfest forum for spouting politically correct platitudes and green-left articles of faith, seems to have really scared the cowardly right-on liberal participants.

The number of children accessing medical treatment to help them change gender has increased 60-fold, leaving Australia’s only clinic for transgender young people struggling to cope with the rise in demand. Exclusive figures obtained by The Sunday Age show the Royal Children’s Hospital gender dysphoria service is seeing 150 patients a year, with new referrals rising from one per year in 2003 to 60 in 2014.